Amendments Nos. 63 and 66 are cognate and should be taken together, with separate decisions if the Committee so requires.
SECTION 85.
Amendment No. 62 not moved.
I move amendment No. 63 :—
In sub-section (1), before paragraph (g) to insert a new paragraph as follows :—
() the provisions of Part VII.
The purpose of the amendment is to provide for the application of the provisions of Part VII to building operations, that is, the part which provides for certificates of fitness in respect of the employment of young persons. We have already had a question raised in regard to docks from the point of view of the casual nature of the work and it might well be argued that there is a casual nature in work in the building trade. In the case of that, however, we should not allow it to influence us because the majority of young persons who will be employed in the building trade will be, in the first instance, apprentices, which is not casual work, and the other types are what are generally called nippers, that is, young labourers. Again, the work is not of such a purely casual nature as to justify the exclusion of the industry from this particular provision and, in fact, I think there is probably a greater argument for requiring some check upon the health of young people entering this trade than there is in any other trade you could think of because these boys are frequently working out under the weather and wholly exposed to it and in many ways are subject to greater health dangers than if they were working inside. On the whole, the nature of the employment in the building trade has sufficient permanency to make it possible to consider the application of Part VII. The great majority of young persons working in the industry will certainly be apprentices because the number of nippers employed is very small and, in fact, is limited by trade union agreement.
If the Committee agrees, I will accept the amendment.
Mr. Lemass
There are some problems which may arise in applying the provisions of Section 78 as they stand. As I understand it, there is an obligation on an employer, if he takes a young person into his service, to have him medically examined after ten days. If a young person in the building trade moves from employer to employer, under that section, he would have to be medically examined at every change and I think we should devise an arrangement under which the medical examination undertaken at the instance of the first employer could hold good for a year, irrespective of whatever employers had the boy in their service for that year. You just cannot apply the section as it stands—it would have to be modified in some respect.
We could take the idea of the amendment and have it examined by the parliamentary draftsman with a view to taking power to make regulations modifying its application.
Mr. Lemass
So long as the net result is that there will be an annual medical examination of the young person.
The problem with regard to the passing of a person from employer to employer would be very small because probably 80 per cent. of the young persons employed in the trade are employed as apprentices who are with one employer. The number of young labourers employed is very limited.
There is not much casualisation of employment here.
Not in regard to young persons, no.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Amendments Nos. 64 and 67 are cognate.
I move amendment No. 64 :—
To add to the section two new sub-sections as follows : —
(4) Any person undertaking any building operations to which this Act applies shall not later than seven days after the beginning thereof, serve on the Minister a written notice stating the name and postal address of the person so undertaking the operations, the place and nature of the operations, whether any mechanical power is used and, if so, its nature and such other particulars as may be prescribed.
(5) The preceding sub-section shall not apply to any operations which the person undertaking them has reasonable grounds for believing will be completed in a period of less than six weeks, except in such cases as the Minister may direct.
This amendment is in respect of the section as a whole. We are dealing with building operations and proposing to apply certain provisions to them. There is later on in the Bill a general provision that an occupier within a month of occupying the factory give notice, but, in the case of the building trade, we are dealing with a somewhat different situation and my suggestion is that there should be a period determined within which notice would be given. Having regard to the character of the building trade, it would not be unreasonable to ask that that notice be given not later than seven days after the commencement of the building operations. In that regard, the reference is to the commencement of the building operations, but, in fact, on practically any building job, the building contractor knows considerably in advance that he is going to undertake the particular work and, therefore, has a much longer period than seven days in which to give the notice.
There is also in sub-section (5) of the amendment provision that, where there are reasonable grounds for believing that the work will be completed in less than six weeks, there will be exemption from the necessity for giving such notice. It is advisable to take some power with regard to some notification of the opening up of building operations so that inspectors can examine whether the provisions set down here are complied with.
Mr. Lemass
As it stands, it would apply to a farmer building a byre or cowshed.
Except for the limitation of six weeks. What happens, if we have no requirement of notice, is that we fall under the general notice of a month.
I am prepared to accept the amendment.
Mr. Lemass
It just could not extend to any building operations—it would have to be building operations of a major kind.
So long as it is understood that we have not to carry out the inspection immediately after we get the notice because that would present physical difficulties.
You should not be putting these provisions in, then. I take it that it would be the size of the building operations—it would also be limited by the general provisions of the Bill in respect of the size of the factory and the number employed.
Mr. Lemass
There is not much point in applying this except to the major type of operation—a big building scheme or where a large building is involved. The type of small building operations carried on around the country could not very well be brought within the scope of it.
If the Committee agrees, we can take the sense of it, making sure that it only applies to operations which are fairly substantial and does not apply to any small type of job.
Mr. Lemass
Operations involving the use of a crane or some other test of that kind.
I take it that Deputy Larkin's main concern is to get the work notified ?
Yes.
You are not concerned with getting the small type of operation work notified ?
No. The view I took is that if a building contractor is required to give notification fairly quickly, he will be a little more careful to see that he does comply because he may expect an inspector to come along even if he does not.
I will have a look at it with a view to putting in an amendment on Report Stage to meet the principle of the amendment.
Amendment, by leave, withdrawn.
Section 85 agreed to.
Section 86 agreed to.
Amendments Nos. 65, 66 and 67 not moved.
Sections 86 to 90, inclusive, agreed to.
SECTION 91.
Question proposed : " That Section 91 stand part of the Bill."
Mr. Lemass
It might be desirable in paragraph (a) of sub-section (1) to put in some safeguard, some limitation of the power of inspection of any part of a building of which a factory forms part. We mentioned here the last day the existence of factory premises in a house which is otherwise used as dwellings, and, as it stands, a legal right of entry into that dwelling would exist. It might be no harm to put in their after " any part of any building " the words " other than a dwelling ".
The dwelling-house might have to be inspected to see where the factory was or in any case to see where it was not.
Mr. Lemass
I admit that is a possibility but as the matter stands it seems to me to give power of entry to dwelling-houses.
It really re-enacts section 119 of an old Act. I am informed that since that time there has never been a complaint.
Mr. Lemass
Due to the agreeable character of the inspector.
Is there no provision for notice to be served on the occupier of a factory of such intended visit by such inspector ?
Mr. Lemass
I hope not.
The general belief is that they get plenty of notice as it is.
They telephone to one another all down the line
He is coming.
With regard to section 91, I have two points to make. One of them would be more properly raised under a later section dealing with the question of the power to initiate proceedings. I have already raised it. On the general question of inspectors, I notice—I may be wrong—that there seems to be no special provision for the issuance of a report. I take it that the report will continue to be issued. What I have in mind is this. I notice that there is no provision in the Bill for the position of chief inspector as such.
I feel that in regard to legislation of this character there is a good argument to be made for the post of chief inspector for this reason. We are dealing here with the question of the application of certain safety and welfare regulations to industry. I think that in many ways it is desirable that we should have an official of the type of a chief inspector who would occupy as between the workers, the employer and also the Minister, a position of some independence and who would have the particular responsibility of ensuring that the provisions set out in the Act were enforced and that the general question of the welfare of the workers would be given adequate attention.
As I understand it, under the preceding Acts, the position of chief inspector did carry a certain independence. In England, in particular, the reports of the chief inspector of factories has been very valuable. He has in many cases raised other aspects of the matter—aspects which in some cases were not even adverted to by trade unions and workers' organisations and which in subsequent years have been studied and later adopted and embodied in new legislation. I think there is a very valuable role to be played by the chief inspector in that way. I can understand the principle which was argued later, that it is desirable to invest the responsibility in the Minister and the Minister operates through his Department. The Department goes on for ever.
Let us trace what occurs where an inspector comes across a breach of the regulations in the Act. He makes his report to the Department. Presumably in the ordinary way that would be initially dealt with by a clerk in the Department who may be of junior or senior rank. He may personally be interested or may not. Then the report starts to go up the whole ladder of the Department until the decision as to whether a prosecution is to be proceeded with or not is made so far as the Department is concerned. All along that was dependent on the officials of the Department who had got many other duties and who have not got the same direct and specialised interest as chief inspector would have.
When the Department deals with the matter it goes to the legal department of the Government to decide on its legal position. There is a certain value, even without taking away from the Minister his final responsibility, of maintaining the position of chief inspector and his special responsibility in regard to the Act and the general principles of applying and improving from time to time this whole question of the approach to the safety of workers and their welfare.
Mr. Lemass
I take it that there will be a chief inspector who will be responsible to the Minister rather than exercise independent statutory powers.
That is the present position. When an inspector makes a report of any transgression of the factories legislation it goes to the chief inspector. He then sends it on the Minister. The chief inspector is in the scheme of things. Final responsibility rests with the Minister who acts on the advice of his legal advisers. We had this discussion on an earlier amendment.
Quite frankly, I think from the point of view of those who want to ensure compliance with the Acts that it is better to put the responsibility on the Minister because if there is any transgression by the owner or occupier of a factory and if action is not taken against the offender, then the person who is aggrieved by the inaction of the Minister has the safeguard that he can get in touch with one of 146 members of the Dáil and put down a question asking why action was not taken in this particular case. If the person responsible for initiating the proceedings is a chief inspector not amenable to the Dáil and who has a statutory power which he can exercise or not as he wishes, then it seems to me that you have not the same opportunity of ascertaining from him why a prosecution was not instituted in the case of an offence under the Act.
I think it is a more democratic way to put responsibility on the Minister and hold him accountable for any failure to prosecute in these cases.
Is it intended to have the position of chief inspector under the Bill without taking away from the Minister ?
Provision is there for one at the moment and I have not so far contemplated dispensing with that.
What would be the position in regard to reports ?
The reports will continue.
Will they, in fact, be the reports of the Minister though prepared by the chief inspector ?
Mr. Lemass
Is there not provision for an annual report on operations ?
We will put it in the Bill and clear up that point.
Would it be possible to consider the desirability of having the report as a report of the chief inspector to the Minister ? What I have in mind is this. A Minister secures the passing of certain legislation and he is charged with the responsibility of applying it. I do not blame him if he does not feel he has to go out of his way to point out the defects of the legislation that has been discovered in the course of its practical application. I can well see the value of having the report from the chief inspector to the Minister. In the course of that report he will not merely deal with the activities of his inspectorate over the year, but he will also set out the difficulties and shortcomings in regard to existing legislation they have discovered as they do in the report in England. Many very valuable observations and suggestions have been made in this respect in England and many of them have been subsequently adopted.
I cannot see—I am not speaking in the personal sense—the Minister, as head of the Department, taking the same keen and detailed interest in and to some extent even pointing out the weaknesses and defects of his own legislation as in the case of a chief inspector who would be both adviser to the Minister and a kind of public watchdog on behalf of those whom this legislation is intended to protect.
Mr. Lemass
You have an advisory council, would they send in an independent report ?
I will look into this matter.
Mr. Lemass
There is one further point on Section 91. Section 95 permits an officer of the sanitary authority to inspect factories for certain purposes, but there is a sub-section which prohibits the disclosure of any information obtained by him with regard to any manufacturing process, but there is no such provision in this section relating to the factory inspectors. It may be that it is not required and that there is some other legislation which imposes that obligation.
Section 91 and 92 agreed to.
Question proposed : "That section 93 stand part of the Bill."
Mr. Lemass
Sub-section (2) of section 93 is fairly widely drawn. It has often been found that in many parts of the country there is only one doctor available to be appointed as a certifying doctor. It may be necessary to take power to modify that very wide limitation in such cases. I am not aware either whether a medical practitioner applying to be appointed or offered an appointment is required to disclose his interest in any factory in his area.
What is the Deputy's suggestion in regard to the first point.
Mr. Lemass
The sub-section is not always applicable to our circumstances. There have been very many occasions when there was only one doctor in an area. While it would be clearly undesirable to appoint a doctor who was himself the occupier of a factory, it might be difficult to get one who had not got an indirect interest in the factory. Experience shows that when you try to get an industrial concern going down the country there is generally pressure brought to bear on local celebrities to contribute to the capital of the concern. It would be surprising if the local doctor would not contribute a fiver. The Minister might take power in certain circumstances to appoint a certifying doctor if he was satisfied that the extent of his interest in any factory was such as not to impede him in the discharge of his duties.
We will look into the matter.
It came to my experience in my area that when we applied to get a certifying doctor to certify one of the scheduled diseases we found he was dead ten years and that no appointment was made.
Mr. Lemass
Usually some other doctor in the area would have an interest in reporting the vacancy.
The point made by Deputy Lemass is that it may be desirable to inquire if a doctor in the circumstances, has any interest in the factory.
Mr. Lemass
As far as I know there is no obligation at the moment on a doctor to declare whether or not he has any interest.
Question put and agreed to.